Focus

We take a dynamic and integrative approach to working with clients. This means we look at what best fits your needs and situation, and tailor the appropriate response using different skills and techniques. Rather than assuming a ‘one size fits all’ approach, we work together with you to understand both what you may need in the short-term, and in the longer term. This holistic perspective is important, putting you at the centre of the work but engaging in such a way as to foster and support your own experience and ability to find the solutions you really need.

There are so many therapies and approaches in the field at present, and clients can take a lot of time, energy and indeed money in finding the right one for them. At LifeChange we explore different pathways to finding the right approach for you from the start. Here are some of the counselling service approaches we adopt:

Psychodynamic

The psychodynamic approach to therapy places emphasis upon our relationships, early personality development and the ongoing interaction between us as adults and the people, situations and environment around us. It traces its origins back to Freud’s psychoanalysis where he provided the first model for the understanding and subsequent treatment of problems associated with the human psyche, mapping out our unconscious and describing defence mechanisms we engage in to deflect from personal, often underlying truth.

Humanistic

A humanistic approach is explicitly concerned with the human context of the development of the individual with an emphasis on subjective meaning and a concern for positive growth rather than pathology. It understands the individual as self-determining, self-actualising, and having an inherent capacity to maximize his or her potential and face life challenges.

Integrative

An integrative approach focuses on the dynamics and potentials of human relationships, with a goal of changing the relations and understanding internal and external resistances to change. One of the major shifts in psychotherapy in the past thirty years has been the acceptance and application of integrative models of therapeutic practice. Most therapies on their own will not completely address presenting life issues or problems of a more general or multi-faceted nature, which may be harder to label or involve more complex or varied influences, and so an integrative approach allows us to find more effective ways of helping clients.

Existential

Existential psychotherapy addresses the fundamental questions of what it means to be alive and where people fit into that question. It explores our physical, social, psychological and spiritual relationships with the world. Prejudice and assumptions are risen above with openness and receptivity so that, even things which have in the past been taken for granted, can be looked at afresh.

Gestalt

Gestalt therapy places focus on the body as well as the mind. As human beings, like organisms we must sense and feel with our senses and intuitions in order to become aware, and find out what we really need in life. The more in touch with our needs we become, the more they become distinct from the background of secondary issues and distractions in our lives. Awareness arises in the ‘here and now’ of life, when we are in ‘contact’ or fully connected with ourselves and our environment.

Mindfulness

Mindfulness is more a practice than a therapy, a way of being rather then a good idea or clever technique. It involves deliberately bringing ourselves and our attention into the present moment with an open-hearted and kind disposition towards ourselves. Mindfulness can help us to find calm and bring stability to our relationship with ourselves and others. It can be facilitated in one-to-one settings or in groups.